I'm a newbie to South Carolina, but I'm pretty sure that everyone I've met in my new Southern home would have a problem with these cakes not being front and center on your Sunday Sweets. (dueling banjos and all)

The mud splattered cake is definitely a technical masterpiece, and from the nearby treads in the sand it looks like the reception is at a dirt-bike / atv (track? range? Whatev) so props on keeping up the theme.

Though as a Yankee, I'm not sure I'll ever understand why we can't find another way to express Southern pride than through using the confederate flag. Even if people don't mean it this way, lots of us read confederate flags as racist. It's a knee jerk reaction maybe, but there it is.

That was awesome! I love how the beer can tier supports on the bottom cake are smushed like half an inch down from the weight of the other tiers. I also agree that the second cake was executed rather well with all things considered.

I am from the South (Appalachian Mtns, actually, so not only am I a Southerner, I'm a hillbilly as well), but I've lived in the north for several years now. These cakes are a perfect example of *exactly* why people think all Southerners/Hillbillies marry our cousins, have no teeth, and still use an outhouse. Thanks, brides, for perpetuating the stereotype. Good Lord. I need a drink, and it needs to be stronger than Bud or Sundrop.

You know... it's okay to say "Redneck". It's alright. I give you permission. You can say it. Go ahead. Redneckiest is also an adjective. (Or is it an adverb?) Remember, it's not "Ain't got no" it's "Ain't got any." Ain't no is a double negative and improper Englush.

I pretty sure the inscription on the Sun Drop cake has a date across it - it definitely ends with 2010 (NOT the word "one"). When I saw the word RACE, I immediately thought NASCAR...but now I'm a little afraid it might be someone's name.

I think the Bud cake is actually kida cute AND well-executed. I wish the chocolate "mud" looked a little neater, it looks like it was just kinda splurted on there way too thickly... but otherwise it's really kinda sweet (besides the beer cans). And no, I don't go muddin', I'm a college grad, I have all my teeth, I only drink wine and my husband and I are completely unrelated.

I mean, if someone wanted that particular design, I think the baker/decorator did an excellent job.

Ohh!! You should do that! Cakes requests that are really shabby, but the baker/decorator does a really good job anyway! You know, a little redemption for the good-humored but slightly-put-out decorators who enjoy your blog.

Holy crap on a cracker! After I was done choking on my coffee and screaming with laughter, I called 3of my friends and told them, "YOU HAVE GOT TO GET TO CAKE WRECKS!!" They just called back, shrieking hysterically. Expect 3 more loyal readers.

The only thing more racist than a Confederate flag is that sign saying "We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone". It sets my WASP blood boiling. I must say that much of Cake Wrecks has a southern theme that escapes me. I depend on the comments for clarifucation. Norine

I'm a Southerner, too. So first I laughed, then was mortified by the cakes. Although I like the Bud cake. Kinda cute. But that Sundrop cake - omg... around here, there's one kind of person you see drinking Sundrop, and it's likely that all of them were at that wedding!

Now, now, now. I'm Southern and while I LOVE a good cold Sundrop, I'm not sure I'd want it supporting my wedding cake. BUT, aren't cakes suppose to represent the couple getting married? Don't judge. My sister wore a tie dyed wrap around skirt and was married on a gravel bank of a creek. It was the most beautiful, relaxing, wonderful wedding I've ever been to. We Southerners are happy the way we are.

"I'm a newbie to South Carolina, but I'm pretty sure that everyone I've met in my new Southern home would have a problem with these cakes not being front and center on your Sunday Sweets. (dueling banjos and all)"

Wow, anonymous, welcome to the South! Don't worry...I'm sure you'll make a lot of new friends with that attitude!

And THANK GOODNESS y'all explained that it was mud! I wasn't paying enough attention and kept thinking it was a visual representation of a $*%# storm. Wowzers!

Please, people, save the proselytizing on the Confederate flag for another day. I'm a Southerner, I agree with you, but let's just save it for another time, okay?

That said, this was a FUN post! I think what's interesting is that they are both awesome in two different ways. One is awesomely baaaaaad. Bad bad bad bad bad. One is awesomely Redneck but admittedly well crafted! The bride and groom actually look cute on the top of the 2nd cake.

I just know that you heard the laughter from deep in the heart of Texas. ding ding dingx1000 - too funny! I thought I was fixin' to choke I was laughing so hard.

Hey, y'all! (That means you in the plural sense, in Texan, and I'm talking to my fellow commenters.) Y'all should review the posted note, "What's a Wreck?" Of course these are wrecks, even though they're well-made. Mmm-hm. I do admit that I have cousins who would agitate for these to be Sunday Sweets, and not using their inside voices, but I have to agree with their wreckiness.

Question: why Bud LIGHT? Do real Southern men need to watch their figures?Also, if you still can't get your voucher from the cruise company, definitely take them to small claims court. You can do it yourself, you'll probably win (since they had a verbal contract with you), and if nothing else, the summons will probably annoy them enough that they'll offer you a voucher in exchange for dropping the case. Oh, and it'll feel really good. :)

These are not badly made cakes at all - especially the muddin' cake! It was very well made for a southern, hillbilly cake! I've lived in TN for 10 yrs now and can see how these cakes come about. YEEEHAAAWWW! Definitely the customer's fault and not the decorator's fault.

I called our local SunDrop distributor (I work next door) to let them know about the wedding cake. The receptionist pulled it up and said, "I can so see that going over here". It's not that we are rednecks or even all that "country", we are just addicted to SunDrop.

I don't know if I should laugh at the fact that I know people who would get cakes like this (I live in Alabama...it happens), or if I should cry because these cakes do nothing to help ease the stereotype so many have towards the South. Agh! I am so confused!

I love love love the bud lite cake. Id never have it for my own but its so cute. my husband used to work for Anheuser Busch and I'm born and raised in the south. It was very well made and so so cute. but how could anyone NOT know that the brown stuff is MUD not poo?? That I dont understand, its perfectly clear to me.

You do realize that the brides at these weddings would probably laugh just as hysterically at a "Trekkie", "Star Wars" or Steampunk cake no matter how well executed? I happened to think that the "mud boggin'" cake with the beer cans was rather cute. I think cakes that are representative of the couple and well executed are way preferable to the boring multi-tiered white wedding themed cake that most people have. I'm from California, have never been to any Southern state, and am a bleeding heart liberal. When I see a Confederate Flag, I think "Southern Pride," not racism. The Civil War wasn't fought simply because the South wanted to keep their slaves. It was way more complicated than that.

And yes, I do realize this is much to serious of a response to a blog such as this. Usually I find this blog really funny, but really, all this post did was make fun of a couple's shared love of a hobby and that they are proud of where they come from. I had a friend who was married in a bookstore and her cake was a large open book. I'm sure there are people who would make fun of that too. Without knowing the couple or their story, some would probably think it was nerdy. Turns out, the couple met while working in that bookstore, and they were both English majors in college.

Oh, and to all those letter writing/boycotting activists rallying against the cruise line . . . go ahead . . . I mean it's not like there are any actual important things going on in the world that you could spend your time advocating for.

I grew up in a small SC town where I know a few people who would actually consider these appropriate and would most certainly use them at their weddings. Scary, I know. (Thankfully, they are not in my circle of friends. Being a small town, it's hard not to know them).

Needless to say, I got out of Dodge right after graduation!

WV: ulistati - a close relative of the ukelele, which is used with (you guessed it) BANJOS!

I just want you to know that I wasn't trying to be offensive. I really meant it that my Southern friends here would want those to be Sunday Sweets. Like someone else pointed out, there are Star Trek & steampunk wedding cakes on the sweets, so why not those? (I put it in a joking manner, so I get why you might have thought I was disparaging everyone I've met here.)

And, aside from the fact that confederate flag decorations and drinking Bud aren't my cup of tea (so to speak), as I pointed out in my comment, the mud cake was really well done.

One of the things I like best about living in the South is that most Southerners have a good sense of humor about being 'country.'

Again, didn't mean to offend, and the South has lots going for it. Some of my best friends are from the South! ; )

Not that anyone cares, but I have to get this off my chest: Here, and on other sites that allow comments, it never fails that someone will take the blogger to task for "making fun of" or "stereotyping" a culture, an ethnic group, a language, a species of fish, etc. (You know who you are.) The next time you're tempted to post such a comment, please ask yourself the following questions:1. Was the blogger referring specifically to ME?2. Have I been elected as the official spokesperson for the group/language/species of fish that is the topic of this post?

@MamaStarfish So I wasn't the only one that was wondering why the bride and groom and then the cake was covered in $}{*+ and why the other cake topper looks like the grooom is sitting on the crapper, taking one.

@Anonymous 1:44 Perhaps you have not had your first cup of coffee yet this morning, or perhaps you have and it was bad, or perhaps you don't drink coffee... but geeez lighten up. If you cannot laugh at yourself, then everyone else will.

Based on the appearance of the "SunDrop" bride, they already had that cake about 5 months BEFORE the one in this post. Heh.

And y'all just keep the comments comin' bless your hearts. If there's one thing real Southern Folk are good at, it's laughing at ourselves. Now let's all have some iced tea and just enjoy the cakes y'hear?

I so wish we could see the bride's (standing behind cake 1) face. Happy? Horrified? Disappointed? Outraged? The possibilities are endless. I know how I'd feel, but then I wouldn't have ordered any of those cake "aspects" in the first place...

LoriK @9:46am: please try to remember the definition of a wreck - anything Jen (or in this case, John) says is a wreck.

The last one? I'm gonna run with the concept that the bride and groom purposely came up with the most oulandish, tackiest cake they could come up with as a joke. Nobody SERIOUSLY wants a cake like that, do they?

I was born a Yankee and became GRITS (Girl Raised In The South)...so I can appreciate that one from ALL angles!

Your and Jen's brains are perverted, twisted, and brilliant - and I could just kiss them! When the banjos go presto and the pictures pan back and the pictures suddenly fit together and become clear....priceless!Love It!!!

1) The horror. Please don't tell anyone I live in the south. Omg. 2) In the center of Atlanta, in the oldest park in the city, we have seen an elderly man marching around carrying a 4'x6' confederate flag up and down the paths. I don't know what he is trying to say, but I'm gonna ask him if I see him again. 3) I was traumatized by yesterday's cruise post, and especially the comments from the meanieheads. So much so that I had a dream about it. You will be happy to know that I called your travel agent and she is taking care of the whole thing. (What have you done to me!?)

Actually it's weird. My name is supposed to always be john (the hubby of Jen) in deference to Jen's incredible awesometude. For some reason though, Blogger capitalizes my name on Cake Wrecks proper. Hm.

Interesting side note: I actually toyed with a few other names...

john (the hubby of the great and mighty JEN...en...en...)

john (the riderless, coconut wielding servant of Queen Jen of Scotland)

From someone who lives in the south and does not want to, I can honestly say I would not be shocked to see either of these at a wedding around these parts. (Help! I'm a northerner! Someone get me outta here!)

*banging on the computer screen as if someone behind the glass can help me*

Just to prove that this isn't necessarily a southern phenomenon... I used to be a florist. A bride came in on a Wednesday and said she needed a wedding bouquet for Saturday. Nothing else, just the bouquet. A bouquet of red roses in the shape of the number 8, for her beloved Dale Earnhardt Jr.

We had to special order the roses on short notice and forming the 8 as a bouquet was a royal pain. We quoted her a minimum of $50 and stressed *minimum*. Turned out to be $85. The fiance came to pick it up and he had an absolute fit. It didn't help that he was drunk as a skunk and I had to call a couple of big guys from the garden center to come over and look tough while lover-boy screamed obscenities at his betrothed over the phone. Then he literally threw $75 at us and walked out since the wedding was in 1/2 an hour.

Monday morning one of the garden center guys came over and asked for clarification of the story. Turns out he was at the local bowling alley at about 6:15 on Saturday and saw a really neat looking 8 made of roses tossed next to a smooshed sheet cake with what probably once said "Congratulations" on it. The bride had told us the ceremony was at 6pm, so in 15 minutes they got hitched, cut the cake, and dumped the bouquet.

My point of all this? It happened in Madison, WI and while the happy couples shown here are arguably lacking in taste, I'll bet they had waaaaaaaaaaay more manners than the couple I had to deal with! And there's something to be said for that.

(Thanks for the post that made me bust out laughing and mentally screaming "No! No!", even if it did bring back my florist trauma.)

I guess I am not the only one who interprets the confederate flag as racist...but especially on a cake where one of the words showing says "RACE". What kind of race it refers to is anyone's guess, since it's on a confederate flag...

SunDrop (which has variations in spelling and capitalization depending on the bottler) is a highly addictive, caffeine-packed, sugar-laden citrus-flavored soft drink which is bottled in select locations in The South. (Think Mountain Dew but sweeter and with more caffeine.) People are known to pack their car trunk full when visiting areas where it is sold. Fewer people are also know to buy it by mail order. And some are known to include it in care packages to soldiers overseas. In addition to drinking it, you can cook with it. Recipes available online. If you have a Food Lion grocery store, you can get SunDrop Sherbet. Fan page on Facebook, too.

It's a Southern thing. Like muddin', the Rebel flag, and the roadkill bill. Kind of hard to explain to Yankees.

Interesting how it's non-Southerners who keep making this a racial issue. I guess people in some parts of the country just haven't moved past that yet. Anyone who understand the South knows that if you say "race," most people will first think you are talking about NASCAR. And the flag doesn't mean as much as people think it does. There are some exceptions of course, put to paraphrase Freud, sometimes a flag is just a flag. If you think it has some sort of meaning, then that's what it means to you. It doesn't mean that it has the same meaning for everyone else.

I laughed so hard I snorted, and snorted so hard it hurt. This is the BEST post ever. OMG, I will never get over this.And, as an official Southerner, am not in the LEAST offended by the redneck jokes!! If you cannot laugh at yourself (and your culture) then you really need to loosen up.

Oh, and for those of you who cannot buy Sundrop, just get a can of Mountain Dew and pour it into a 2 pound bag of sugar. Stir well and you have Sundrop. :)

Love, love, love the musical accompaniment (sp) to the posts!BTW, thanks for sharing your misery from the last few days (though I'm sorry for your dissapointment). One of the things I love about CW/Epbot is that you are "real" here. Keep it coming!

well john (the hubby of Jen) aka john (the riderless, coconut wielding servant of Queen Jen of Scotland) - I LOVE Monty Python and the Holy Grail, so I agree, that this is a great alias. You are not only a good porter, but a pretty darn good minstrel, too.

And "john the offensive" is fitting, too, whether being given the name by readers who just don't get it - or by the marvelous way in which you handle them.

All of these names are john the mark. (That's a cover for you Jen, in case you ever call out the name "Mark" in your sleep. Just please tell me it's not Mark Hamill.)

I have.. no words.. laughing too hard lmao!!! I love the music to go with these cakes. Even made my hubby stop playing Halo: Reach for a minute to see why I was dying of laughter. I hope the cakes were delicious after all of that.. wreckage.

The bud light cake is truly awesome. I'm guessing the "sun drop" bride showed her baker the picture and said "make this", and ended up with her wreck. I don't consider the bud light cake a wreck at all, and in fact quite the engineering/technical masterpiece.

Great, Jen. I now have the munchkins from Spaceballs stuck in my head, thanks to your last line. "Dink DINK dink!"

Also, am I the only one who thought the mud-slung cake topper was actually cute? I mean, I found the entire cake to be well-done. It was a horrible, horrible *idea* for the cake, but it was, IMHO, completely well-executed.

I tried to post a comment yesterday, but it's not here today. Dunno if I got moderated or if the system just ate it, but I'll partially reproduce it now:

I think the funniest part is that the Bud Light cake is actually pretty handsome despite the subject matter and the fact that it has Bud Light cans on it. The weirdest part, of course, is that the Sundrop cake's top tier looks like it's levitating (seriously, how is it physically possible for us to see the tops of those cans if they're holding it up? And if they're not, what IS?

One of the other comments, though, surprised me: "The only thing more racist than a Confederate flag is that sign saying "We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone". It sets my WASP blood boiling."

Really? I always assumed that "we have the right to refuse service to anyone" meant "we will kick you out if you're obnoxious." I've never actually seen someone be refused service in a place that had one of those plaques, though. Also, the Confederate flag is...a complicated symbol. Really, the history of the South and the Civil War are a lot more complex than is generally acknowledged, and I doubt this is meant to be a race thing. Of course, now that someone else pointed out the word 'RACE' on the SunDrop cake, I'm curious about what else it says on there. Can't quite make out the other word that's visible--are we talking white pride, or NASCAR pride here? :p

PS: glad to see a post today--in light of yesterday's events, when there wasn't one up this morning I got a little worried about you guys. Hope things start looking up soon.

Well, the beer can cake was done perfectly. The chocolate mud splatters on the little adorable bride and groom and on the cake itself...perfect! I am not a southern girl but I can totally see how this cake was appropriate and sooo cute. OTOH the soda can cake is kind of like it's inbred cousin. It certainly tried but it didn't achieve the adorableness that the mudslogging beer cake did.Oh the the addition of the music. Totally perfect!

Posting as a displaced by choice Canadian living in Arkansas, may I just say, "Feel my pain, people. That's it. Grab hold of it. Hold a telethon on my behalf, or something." LOVED the accompanying music. I laughed so hard, I cried!

1) The Bid Light cake is excellently made. Not my style, but to each her own.

2) It's supposed to be mud, not fecal matter. I've (unwillingly) been mudding. It's disgusting, but kind of fun and made for a very funny story.

3) I'm a Southern woman with 2 degrees, impeccable taste, I'm not marrying my cousin, I don't drive a pick up truck, I hate Nascar, I don't like Sun Drop or Cheerwine, and I don't find the Confederate flag racist. It is symbolic of an important part of our nations history and my southern heritage. I have no problem with the flag and I am as far as a racist as anyone can be and I really resent all of the "OMG! Racism!" comments. Anyone who things that the confederate flag automatically equals racism has obviously never been to Myrtle Beach, SC which has a VERY diverse group of tourists and you can't go a foot without seeing the flag emblazoned on something.

Anonymous, the fact is that the Confederacy was formed mostly in order to preserve white people's "right" to own black people. That's why some of us "find" its flag just a tad redolent of racism. Even when it shows up at a beach resort.

There are things to be proud of about being Southern (mint juleps! Flannery O'Connor! still knowing how to use "ma'am" and "sir"!) and things to acknowledge as past sources of shame. It would be nice if Southerners chose a flag that celebrated the good things instead of claiming the South's greatest tragedy as a reason for pride.

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What's a Wreck?

What's a Wreck?

A Cake Wreck is any cake that is unintentionally sad, silly, creepy, inappropriate - you name it. A Wreck is not necessarily a poorly-made cake; it's simply one I find funny, for any of a number of reasons. Anyone who has ever smeared frosting on a baked good has made a Wreck at one time or another, so I'm not here to vilify decorators: Cake Wrecks is just about finding the funny in unexpected, sugar-filled places.

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